Daniel Boulud's Cafe Boulud Cookbook: French-American Recipes for the Home Cook

Introduction\ For almost one hundred years, the locals of St.-Pierre-de-Chandieu, my small hometown outside Lyon, met daily at the roadside Café Boulud, the petit café and not-quite restaurant that my great-grandparents, grandparents, and later my parents took pride in tending on their family farm. It was the rendezvous point for generations of townsfolk. It was the place people went to begin and finish a day, to toast births and marriages and to mourn losses. It was where love affairs started and, of course, where some ended. It was warm, welcoming, and a vital part of village life. And, it was a memory I always carried with me.\ From the time I was an apprentice, a fourteen-year-old living away from home, I dreamed of creating a restaurant that would capture the warmth and conviviality of my family's café. Thirty years later, I opened my own Café Boulud in New York City, the city that is today as much my home as St.-Pierre-de-Chandieu was when I was a child.\ Café Boulud opened at the perfect moment in my life, at the time when I could truly say, "I am a French-American chef." The opening of Café Boulud, my thirtieth anniversary in the kitchen, and the midpoint in my French-American career share a date. Since I have now cooked in America for as long as I cooked in France, it was the ideal moment to pay tribute to the cuisine I grew up with, the kitchens I trained in, and the foods I've come to know and love in America, all of which Café Boulud and the Café Boulud Cookbook celebrate.\ Just as I do at the Café, I have arranged the recipes in this book according to the four muses that have inspired my cooking: La Tradition, the classic, full-bodied foods of France; La Saison, the bounty of the market; Le Voyage, the foods of lands near and far; and Le Potager, vegetarian dishes that extol the goodness of the garden.\ At Café Boulud, the menu is presented in four columns — La Tradition, La Saison, Le Voyage, and Le Potager — and we encourage people to move from column to column according to their cravings. I urge you to do the same: Please, choose recipes from each of the sections. There are no rules — you can plan an all-Tradition meal, or skip around, choosing, for example, a starter from Le Voyage, a main course from La Saison, and a dessert from any of the sections.\ Similarly, I hope you'll feel free to pick and choose components within a recipe. I've presented the recipes just as I would serve them to you if you were my guest at Café Boulud. So, for instance, the recipe for Peppered Arctic Char includes the parsnip mousseline that we serve under the fish and the soft shallots, cooked in red wine and port, that we serve over it. I've given you the recipe for the complete dish so that you can understand the spirit of my cooking, the way I create a dish and the way it would be presented at the Café. At home, you may not want to make the dish in its entirety, or you may want to serve your favorite mashed potatoes with the peppered char. By all means, do it! I want you to have fun with these recipes, to use them often, to make them your own.\ Following the sections dedicated to La Tradition, La Saison, Le Voyage, and Le Potager, you'll find a short chapter of basic preparations — pastry crusts and creams as well as simple stocks and condiments — that we use often in the kitchen; a glossary of terms, techniques, and ingredients that you can turn to if you have a question about how we do certain things at the Café; a short batterie de cuisine, including pots, pans, and a few gadgets that make cooking more efficient — and more pleasurable; and, finally, a source guide, a list of trusted suppliers who will send you the same ingredients I use at Café Boulud.\ To create this collection, I have chosen the recipes that hold the dearest memories for me, the ones most tied to my culinary life in France and America, and the ones most enjoyed at Café Boulud. All of the recipes have been tested so that they will work as well in your kitchen as they do in mine, and all are offered to you with the hope that when you share this food with your family and friends, it will bring you as much satisfaction, indeed, as much joy, as it has brought me over the years.\ Daniel Boulud, New York, 1999\ Copyright © 1999 by Daniel Boulud and Dorie Greenspan

ContentsIntroductionForeword by Martha StewartLa Tradition: the traditional dishes of French cookingSoups, Starters, Small Dishes, Lunches, and Anytime FoodMain CoursesSide DishesDessertsLa Saison: the seasonal specialties of the marketSoups, Starters, Small Dishes, Lunches, and Anytime FoodMain CoursesDessertsLe Voyage: dishes from lands far and nearSoups, Starters, Small Dishes, Lunches, and Anytime FoodMain CoursesDessertsLe Potager: vegetarian dishes that celebrate the bounty of the gardenSoups, Starters, Small Dishes, Lunches, and Anytime FoodGrains, Beans, Pasta, and RisottoRoasted, Stuffed, and Braised VegetablesDessertsBase RecipesGlossary of Terms, Ingredients, and TechniquesBatterie de CuisineSource guideAcknowledgmentsIndex

\ From Barnes & NobleA Conversation with Daniel Boulud \ It is rather awe-inspiring to be in the presence of Daniel Boulud, who has been—more than once or twice—described as America's greatest French chef. Of course, it didn't hurt that I was sitting in a most comfortable chair in the lounge of his very beautiful restaurant, Restaurant Daniel, completely enveloped in the fragrance of massive bouquets of flowers, the gentle aromas of the four-star menu, and the quietly lingering voices of a lunchtime crowd. The sly Gallic charm of Chef Boulud was only the very delicious icing on the cake. What a great way to spend an afternoon!\ As we talked about his latest cookbook, Daniel Boulud's Café Boulud Cookbook, his enthusiasm for his craft and his knowledge of the culinary arts enthralled me. I asked how this book differed from his first very successful book, Cooking With Daniel Boulud, for which I had also interviewed him for bn.com. "The first book was an extension of my newsletter [Easy Cooking with Great Chefs]; it focused on the seasonality of the marketplace and was more traditional in concept, with the expected chapters devoted to a particular food," he responded. "The Café Boulud Cookbook, on the other hand, is quite nontraditional in concept in that it is broken down into four sections—La Tradition, La Saison, Le Voyage, and Le Potager. The book burst forth at the same time that I was creating Café Boulud, so my creativity was very high. It was also at this point that I suddenly understood that I had gone from being a French chef to being a French-American chef." "What exactly does being a French-American chef mean to you?" I queried. "Well, I'm certainly very French, but I have cooked as long in New York [15 years] as I cooked in France," Daniel replied. "I am very much charmed by the United States. It has been inspirational to me—the markets, the lifestyle, the openness, the ethnic variety have all had an impact on the way that I cook. I would say that I have been deeply touched by America."\ Being particularly interested in how American children eat and are fed, I asked Chef Boulud if his ten-year-old daughter had remained under his influence, or if she, like most American children, lived on junk food. "Oh, no," Daniel answered. "She eats traditional French food and is very conscious of how food is grown. When we are in France, she goes to the garden to pick the vegetables for our meals. She knows this is a unique experience, and she loves it. But, she also knows all of the junk food and, from time to time, I even join her in a hot dog feast!" "Is there something that you prepare that your daughter really loves?" I asked. "Both Alix and I love pasta—I always have a few recipes in my books. And, she also enjoys all kinds of salads, which I prepare at home." What a lucky girl!\ Reading through Daniel Boulud's Café Boulud Cookbook, I was struck by the versatility of the recipes—each section really does offer what it promises, whether it's traditional recipes (sometimes updated), recipes bursting with the flavors of the seasons, recipes inspired by travel and other cultures, or extraordinary vegetarian dishes. But are they home-cook friendly, I wondered. Daniel must have read my mind because he said, "The book was written by Dorie Greenspan, who was very careful to make my recipes approachable. Sometimes the ingredient list may be long but the steps are well explained and easy for the home cook to read. Her writing is really pleasurable to read—it is so animated."\ And as we were about to say our good-byes, Daniel said, "Since it is getting to be holiday time, I would like to suggest a menu for entertaining for your Barnes & Noble.com readers. My favorite recipe from the Café Boulud Cookbook would be the starter, Game Bird and Foie Gras Pâté (which can be made a week in advance—in fact it will taste better if it is), followed by Crab Salad with Green Apple Gelée, then a wonderful dish, Cod, Clams, and Chorizo Basquaise, and finally either Potato and Almond Cake or Vanilla Blueberries, aka Bill's Blues [the Bill being President William Jefferson Clinton, for whom Daniel has cooked a number of times]." To quote from some of the advance publicity material for the Café Boulud Cookbook: "Imagine. A table full of Daniel Boulud's food, and you made it," from a menu devised especially for you by the chef himself. Bon Appétit!\ —Judith Choate\ \ \ \ \ \ Laurie Glenn BuckleIn The Cafe Boulud CookbookBoulud's has 200 recipes divided into four sections, each representing a theme that influences his menus: classic French dishes, seasonal specialities, world cuisine and dishes from the potager, or vegetable garden. This big, beautiful work succeeds in bringing Boulud's inspired food to the home kitchen. \ — Bon Appetit\ \ \ Publishers WeeklyEchoing the French-American accent of food from his casual Caf Boulud, the New York City chef also acclaimed for Restaurant Daniel encourages home cooks to prepare meals as he does, by attending to four inspirations: his own French tradition, seasonal foodstuffs, international flavors and the kitchen garden. Like many recipes based on restaurant selections--particularly French--the dishes here often require multiple steps and careful attention to detail. Those cooks with time and ambition will be able to create the more demanding fare, such as Sea Bass en Cro te, which makes a theatrical appearance inside its cloak of puff pastry. Costumed differently are Mustard-Crusted Calf's Liver, which requires a difficult-to-find 1 3/4-pound piece of meat, and Chestnut-Crusted Loin of Venison. Lighter dishes reflecting the chef's meticulous touch include Morels and Pea Shoot Gnocchi in a Light Broth, and Crab Salad with Apple Gel e. Earthier and easier are Lamb and Bean Casserole, and Bay Scallop and Tomato Gratin. Boulud's (Cooking with Daniel Boulud) creative agility is evident throughout, as when he intensifies Tuna Vitello, a switch on the Italian classic vitello tonnato, featuring saut ed sweetbreads, and A Dozen Baby Spring Vegetables with Vanilla, Ginger and Basil. 6-city author tour. (Nov.) Copyright 1999 Cahners Business Information.\ \ \ \ \ Library JournalInspired by the meals of his homeland near Lyons, James Beard award winner Boulud (Cooking with Daniel Boulud) teams up with IACP award winner Greenspan (Baking with Julia) to serve up a colorful collection of recipes featuring dishes from his New York City restaurant. The cookbook is divided into four sections: "La Tradition," or classic French dishes; "La Saison," seasonal specialties; "Le Voyage," dishes inspired by varied world cultures with some fusion touches; and "Le Potager," culinary delights from the garden. Recipes run the gamut from traditional fare such as Pommes Frites and Apricot Tart to cutting-edge culinary treats like Duck Dumplings in Broth and White Gazpacho. Many of the dishes assume some degree of culinary experience, but clear instructions accompany each recipe. Armchair cooks will appreciate the culinary tidbits that introduce each recipe, as well as the book's stunning photographs. Recommended for mid-sized and large public libraries.--John Charles, Scottsdale P.L., AZ Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information.\ \